Wow, it feels like FOREVER since I finished my last piece! This year has not been conducive to creating art. I’ve done my best despite the circumstances which kept popping up (moving, medications, long ME flares, devoting a ton of time to the gallery show, stress from my recent battle among other things) but it’s felt like a very dry year creatively. All I can do is my best though, and even when the ME really cramps my style, I still manage to get pieces finished… just much more slowly than I would like.

It was in this depressed feeling of “I haven’t created anything in the longest time imaginable” that today’s image was born. When my regular creative outlets are blocked to me (by, say, solid weeks of migraines as I adjust to each new medication dosage), I become despondent and depressed. Life slowly loses its flavor and color and if I’m not careful, I’ll sink into a pit of despair just like Artax in The Neverending Story. Luckily, I have Geoff and my friends and family around to cheer me on and make sure I never sink too low, but much of it is outside of anyone’s control.

As I mentally pictured how I felt, this was it. A big, ugly cloud of despair, depression, worthlessness, swirling around my head. But this time, unlike my last self portrait which explored a similar theme, I wanted to show a bit of hope at the same time. The cloud is surrounded, penetrated and pierced by beautiful, golden rays of light. They stream in through the darkness, weaving through its thick blackness. The darkness cannot survive in the light. It will be broken up and dissipate. And while I know this will probably not be my last battle with depression, I also know that each round will eventually be over… and once again, the light will have won. That is the hope I cling to when the clouds cover me.

I’d like to mention my friend and very talented photographer Robert Cornelius’s Dust to Dust series as it provided some inspiration in my planning out of the darkness cloud. Thanks, Robert! 🙂 He’s an incredible photographer and all-around cool dude, so check out his work if you’re not familiar with it!

This image belongs to my Eternal Storms series on depression, anxiety and other mental health issues. These topics are still seen as quite taboo to discuss, something I hope to help with by portraying what living with them is like openly and honestly. Silence and shame never helped a single illness get cured. We need to be able to speak openly about our experiences, without judgement or fear, if we’re ever going to healed from them.

Do you have depression? Try being a little more honest next time a trusted friend asks how you are. You don’t have to go into excruciating detail, but try to avoid the temptation to simply answer “fine,” unless you actually are. And if you have friends or family who you suspect or know suffer from any kind of mental ailment? Invite them to tell you about it, ask some questions, assuring them that talking to you is safe and you will not judge them or call them crazy. It is crucialthat you answer whatever they tell you with love. It is incredibly hard for people to open up and talk to others about these problems, so take their trust very seriously and treat it with the gentlest and greatest respect.

As we approach Thanksgiving, let’s be thankful for the help and support we have. For the people dedicated to helping us win our fight. For the people who will listen to us with only love and understanding in their hearts. The people who give us hope. The inner strength we are able to find when we think we’ve exhausted it all. Those extra beams of light when we need them the most. We need more people like this in the world. Let’s try and all be them to each other. The simple fact that there are people in the world who try to reach this goal is something I am very thankful for!

Blackfish. The documentary about captive whales that will break your heart and move you to action.

By now, you all have probably read my open letter to Jack Hanna. You probably saw Concrete Cell, the first of a short series of underwater photos inspired by the film. As I do, I turned to art to help me express my thoughts. I’ve just completed the last two photos for the series, and I’d like to share them with you here.

I set up an underwater shoot with Katie, with the intention to create something inspired by Blackfish. Something sad and cold, that touched on the tragedy of the film. Something that would help me work through the troubling emotions the movie had brought up, and lessen my feeling of helplessness about the plight of the whales.

It was a great shoot. We captured everything we wanted, my camera behaved itself, and even the sudden appearance of gardeners tending to the yard around the pool was just another story to laugh about. As she often does, Katie seemed to instantly understand what it was I wanted to express and needed very little direction. My new wetsuit worked wonders and even though I still hated being wet at all, at least this time I wasn’t a purple, shaking mess by the time the shoot was done.

Editing the photos was another matter. Having to visit such an emotionally dark place whenever I worked on them was not easy. I had to take breaks and work on lighter photos. But I’m proud of myself for sticking it out; doing what I felt I needed to do despite the difficulty of it.

In the first photo, we wanted to recreate Tilikum’s misery in this iconic photo of him, taken by Colleen Gorman, languishing alone in his solitary confinement.

Photo by Colleen Gorman; click on the photo to be taken to her excellent article on her blog The Orca Project detailing his miserable existence.

The second photo is an impression of the anguish of all the captive dolphins and whales and a memorial to all their deaths.

As this year draws to an end, I can’t help but think of what a huge impact Blackfish has already had on society. It was only shown on CNN in October of this year. The backlash against SeaWorld and its supporters has been immense. Sponsors have fled, popular bands have refused to perform there. Petitions of every kind are circulating, making demands. Change is coming. But it cannot come fast enough.

It’s easy to feel helpless to bring big change about. We are all only one person after all; one drop amidst a great ocean of people. But, as they say in Cloud Atlas, what is an ocean but a multitude of drops?

I want my drop to fall on the side of animal rights. And I hope that 2014 brings about the ocean of change that has already begun. I believe it can happen 🙂

I want to give you all a few quick updates here on the blog. First though, I’d like to introduce my first Blackfish-inspired photo today, titled “Concrete Cell.” It is the first in a series, but I was too excited to share this photo to wait until they’re all finished.

The often-cited comparison of SeaWorld’s whale enclosures being the equivalent size of a bathtub to you or me not only deeply saddened me, but also sparked the idea for this photo. Imagine it. When you’re not forced to perform, you live in this sad, colorless, sterile world of concrete and shadows. The intelligence of these whales makes their living conditions even crueler and more heartless; sentient beings shoved into tiny compartments where they die a little more every day.

Secondly, there has been a lot of response tomy post about suicide and Chronic Fatigue Syndrome/myalgic encephalomyelitis. This is one of those topics that is very, very real, but rarely discussed in public. Or even in private, for that matter. There is always a correlation between any kind of chronic illness and suicide, because there is only so much a person can endure. This post has been shared quite a bit already, but I would love for it to reach even more people, and hopefully find its way to the original person who found my blog by searching “I have Chronic Fatigue Syndrome and I want to give up.” I understand that feeling. My blog will rage in its way against cruelties, abuses and atrocities, but its arms are always open to the ill, the hopeless, the voiceless and those in need. This is not a place of judgement. This is a place of love and acceptance.